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What UX and sales have in common

In the past sales has often been disregarded. But modern sales is more like UX. The goal of modern sales is to bring a positive impact to both the seller and the buyer. This is called a win-win. Both parties win.
Shortcuts or favors result in one party losing which is not a sustainable strategy.
For the buying to be winning a seller has to care about the needs of the buyer. These needs range from jobs to be done to personal ones. As a seller you employ UX research methods like interviews and open questions targeting the thoughts and feelings of the buyer. The wins are always personal never something abstract like a company strategy or even KPIs. But: the wins are based upon result: measurable, objective things like conversion rates, efficiency improvements, closed sales. Together they are called win-results: an objective metric that has a personal benefit for the buyer.

Assumptions in UX can be dangerous and can doom a whole product. Assuming win-results or the wrong needs you can miss the buyer completely and lose the sale. In strategic sales every uncertain or missing information or contact is regarded as a red flag. UX should also mark its blind spots. The product kata is a great way to eliminate assumptions in a project.

But even if you know the needs you have to take into account the context. The personal and emotional situation a buyer is in has direct consequences for how you need to address him. The same with UX where context and the job to be done control your solutions – what works and what not.